Who is Notre Dame head coach Marcus Freeman's wife Joanna?

The Notre Dame Fighting Irish head coach reached the College Football Playoff National Championship. He admits he couldn't have done it without his wife.

Dec. 5, 2024: Notre Dame Fighting Irish head football coach Marcus Freeman with his wife Joanna / IMAGO / Icon Sportswire

Marcus Freeman is the hottest name in college football, and well, now a hot name for NFL teams too.

The Notre Dame Fighting Irish head coach led his team past the Penn State Nittany Lions, 27-24, in an instant classic. A heartbreaking Drew Allar interception, and the ultimate Greg McElroy announcer jinx, with less than a minute remaining sealed the deal and sent the almost 39 year old (his birthday is tomorrow, Jan. 10!) into the history books by becoming the first coach of Black and Asian descent to make it to the CFP National Championship.

"It is an honor and I hope all coaches, minorities, Black, Asian, white, it doesn't matter, great people continue to get opportunities to lead young men like this," Freeman said after the game.

But enough about him. What about his wife Joanna, who is the mother of their six children - Vinny, 17, Siena, 12, Gino, 11, Nico, 9, Capri, 7, and Rocco, 6. (Freeman also has another daughter, Bria, 18, from a previous relationship.)

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Dec. 5, 2024: Notre Dame Fighting Irish head football coach Marcus Freeman with his wife Joanna / IMAGO / Icon Sportswire

Notre Dame can thank hated rival Ohio State for Marcus and Joanna

As a two-time, second-team All-Big Ten linebacker for the Ohio State Buckeyes, Freeman met Joanna, a local news reporter, because they lived in the same housing complex while both living in Columbus, getting first introduced by his best friend.

Freeman tried to make it in the NFL, but after only getting so far as practice squads, for the last time with the Houston Texans in 2009, he solely concentrated on coaching, with him and Joanna continuing to be long distance with her remaining a reporter for the Columbus CBS affiliate.

“We don’t have a super romantic love story,” Joanna said to Yahoo! Sports. “We had a lot of breakups and make-ups. We fell hard. We fell fast. We were really young when we met, and a lot of ways, we really grew and matured into adults together.”

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Marcus Freeman with his mom and wife Joanna Freeman on Mother's Day / Marcus Freeman/Instagram

Lean years before the good times

Joanna was the breadwinner for the family when she and Freeman first got married, and they also had already had their first child, Vinny, when the former linebacker became the linebackers coach for Kent State, making $42,000 a year.

Mrs. Freeman decided to quit her job to be with him full-time.

“She has the most pure heart,” Marcus has said. “She’s loyal to her family and people that she loves. It hasn’t always been easy. At times, I can take her for granted. She’s an Italian pistol. If I’m a jerk, she’s going to be ready to fire back. But she’s so loyal. There’s no one else I’d rather do life with than her.”

This all makes sense given she grew up in Massillon, Ohio, and her entire family are not only Italian, they're diehard Cleveland Browns fans.

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Joanna Freeman with their six kids / Marcus Freeman/Instagram

'Single parent' Joanna is the rock behind Freeman's success

"To do what I do, you have to have the most unselfish wife in the world. Like, a lot of times she is a single parent. And the other part is that I try to blend."

That was Marcus Freeman on a recent episode of Robert Griffin III's podcast, "Outta Pocket with RG3."

"There's no balance. There is not a balance being a head coach and being a husband and father. "

A perfect microcosm of that balance happened at Freeman's introductory press conference to replace Brian Kelly at Notre Dame. With all six children in attendance, she had to be the four boys to sit still for 20 minutes. Then they could go run around the fieldhouse.

Needless to say, Marcus Freeman's meteoric rise at just 39 years old doesn't happen without Joanna.

Jan 2, 2025: Notre Dame Fighting Irish head coach Marcus Freeman looks on against the Georgia Bulldogs. / Stephen Lew-Imagn Images